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By 7 a.m. on a recent Thursday, Dylan Zeitlyn was already squinting in the bright sunshine as he knelt in a bed of arugula, rhythmically slicing handfuls and tossing them into a waiting tub.

Zeitlyn, 42, is the remaining founding member-owner of Diggers’ Mirth Collective Farm, which he started 19 years ago in Burlington’s Intervale with two college friends from the University of California at Santa Cruz.

“It was a collective from the beginning,” he explained. “The way we made decisions, it was always collective management. For years and years, we didn’t hire anybody. The member-owners did all the work.”

Over its lifetime, the farm has only had 12 member-owners, a testament to its cooperative management style in which meetings are generally held in the field where everyone is working or over lunch with each member having equal say.

The 11-acre farm cultivates about six acres each year. Severe spring flooding this year delayed everything by about a month, which the members troubleshot together with their usual approach and will each experience with an equal reduction in their share of the profit.

“We’re about a quarter of a season behind,” Zeitlyn said matter-of-factly, “and we probably won’t catch up.”

Spreading the veggie love

All five current collective members were at the farm on this Thursday along with one of three employees they now hire seasonally, a pool from which new members often come. Thursdays are all hands on deck to harvest for Friday’s pre-weekend wholesale deliveries and the Saturday Burlington Farmers Market.

Diggers’ Mirth is also a linchpin vendor of the ONE (Old North End) Market on Tuesdays, which it helped start, and recently launched veggie truck visits of that part of Burlington on Wednesday and Friday afternoons, like an ice cream truck selling carrots instead of popsicles.

“We play music and people dance,” said Elango Dev, 43, a 13-year collective member. “It’s about visibility and selling vegetables in a neighborhood that doesn’t have access and having fun.”

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“We all live in that neighborhood,” added Hilary Martin, 35, who is in her ninth year with the collective.

Working together

In the processing shed, three huge wash tubs were filling up with water for the greens, which would be triple-washed and then spun dry in repurposed washing machine inserts.

“We used to use a honey extractor hooked up to a bike,” Martin explained. “It was very cool but not so efficient. We didn’t have any power on the farm. Now we have solar panels on top of the delivery truck that power an inverter and that powers the spinners.”

While Zeitlyn, Martin, Dev, Hayden Boska (2-year employee and 2- year member) and employee Isha Abdi harvested greens, S’ra DeSantis (11-year member) sat at the edge of the field on the phone running through the price list of vegetables and herbs with accounts such as City Market, Mirabelles and Trattoria Delia and taking their orders.

Even without an organizational structure, team members each have informal roles. DeSantis is the bookkeeper while others take responsibility for different aspects of planting and other tasks.

Diggers’ Mirth keeps a relatively low profile in the restaurant, food and farming community. “Our secret marketing strategy is to be really laid back,” Zeitlyn said with a smile.

It was almost 8 a.m. when DeSantis pulled her ear away from the phone. “You guys can stop the arugula now,” she called to her colleagues.

Market day

One of the revolving responsibilities at Diggers’ Mirth is Saturday market day, which cycles through the five member-owners weekly.

The Saturday following the sunny Thursday morning harvest, it was Elango Dev’s turn to load the farm’s brightly painted truck at 6 a.m.

He wiped the early morning dew off the windshield and backed the truck up to the loading dock where fragrant pails of basil waited and some of the farm’s garlic harvest hung curing on the warehouse wall. As Dev pulled out onto the road, Mara and Spencer Welton of Half Pint Farm waved as they drove in to load up for the market.

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After crossing a very quiet Church Street where restaurant tables and chairs were stacked tightly, the Diggers’ Mirth truck was one of the first to arrive at the market. Dev likes to arrive early, he said, “So I can set up and still have time for coffee and a bagel before customers arrive.”

Burlington Farmers Market coordinator Chris Wagner, 34, was one of the few who was already set up, having been up since 5 a.m. driving around putting up market signs.

A growth market

Over his four-year tenure, Wagner said, the market has added about 20 spots, and now has 68 vendors, 60 of which are weekly regulars with 8 day-vendor spots. “Every year the city has given us a little bit more space,” he said.

This morning he was dealing with one of the challenges of being in the city center: a boom truck from the downtown construction project blocking one of the assigned farmer parking spots.

Dev tried to help by moving the Diggers’ Mirth truck a little to squeeze the most space out of the crowded street and started up a familiar friendly banter with potter Claude Lehman, one of the farm’s neighboring vendors. “We discuss politics,” Dev said with a chuckle. “We don’t always agree.”

As Dev unloaded vegetables and set up crates and shelving, he explained the farm’s name.

“We’re named after a farming collective from the 17th century that was anti-enclosure and proclaimed land should be open to all,” he said. Lore has it that the original Diggers’ Mirth collective reclaimed abandoned land on which they grew food for themselves and the poor.

Across the green, David Zuckerman and the team at Full Moon Farm were setting up their stand with a summer treasure trove of corn and melons at the center. It is Full Moon’s 13th year at the market, farmer and co-owner Zuckerman said.

“When I first came, it was just one strip. Then they added the diagonal into what we called no-man’s land,” Zuckerman said. “Now anywhere you go in the market there are throngs of people. It’s a festival atmosphere. People come not only to buy food but also to socialize. You bump into so many people you know. Now that it’s spread out, people linger longer, they get hungry; they see bags of things they might have missed and ask, ‘Where’d you get that?’”

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Work with value

More trucks started pulling up, unloading flowers, cheese, vegetables and fruits, bread and pastries. Dev carefully unpacked and organized the Diggers’ Mirth display of bunched beets, crates of cucumbers and beans, bagged and loose carrots and Napa cabbage. He arranged baskets of herbs: chives, flat and curly parsley, rosemary, oregano and cilantro. He pulled out bags of mesclun, arugula and a special blend of greens called spicy mix. He made a small pile of feathery-topped fennel.

Dev surveyed the plenty and paused with a concerned look.

“I just feel like I’m missing some things,” he said and quickly texted Martin to check. “That’s one of the problems of not doing the market weekly,” he noted. “You don’t have it down.”

While waiting for Martin, he took a break and ate a bagel. Dev studied history and philosophy at the University of Vermont. He said he did not expect to find a career in farming, but “It is something very easy to value. It’s not complicated finding meaning and value in it.”

“I like Burlington,” he continued. “I like the sort of community the enterprise is a part of. I like running around and talking to the produce people. I like our customers, seeing their children get old, seeing them get old.”

The Burlington market, he said, is fun but added, “I like the Tuesday market better. It’s our neighborhood. I see my kids’ teachers. I don’t think I would enjoy this market so much if I had to do it every week.”

Starting slow

The 8 a.m. bell rang out from City Hall and Dev took out the cash box and scale as Martin arrived with the missing escarole, eggplant, onions and baby beet greens. A local chef walked by with his dog and said he’d be back. Customers started strolling by with boxes of plums or eating whoopie pies. (Yes, for breakfast.) Dev’s first sale went into the cash box at 8:15 a.m.

The day started a little slow, according to Dev, who said it’s hard to pinpoint what affects traffic. “A good market day nets the farm $1,200 to$1,400,” he said. “The day will be lovely and it’s not necessarily great. Some events like Pride (Festival) make it a really good week. Some weeks where you see a lot of foot traffic, there are not a lot of sales.”

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He paused to respond to a customer asking for golden beets and then another asking how to cure her own garlic. As sales piled up, Dev added numbers easily in his head. “We had this thing in fifth grade called mental math,” he said with a smile.

Boska dropped by with a sign for a basil special and reminded Dev of the discussion to keep the cucumbers and eggplants in the shade so that any remaining might still be sold Monday.

Customers in bike shorts, with dogs on leashes or babies in strollers (or both), carrying overflowing baskets and rolling carts wound their way by the stand. A significant number spoke French and appeared to hail from Quebec. The glowing bouquets of sunflowers at the neighboring stand of River Berry Farm sold steadily and marched off in the arms of customers with matching sunny smiles.

A woman shopping for a dinner party bought a pile of smooth-skinned cucumbers and an armful of glossy amethyst eggplant. “I didn’t really know what I was going to make but then it starts telling you,” she said. “The food tells you.”

Veggies for all

Kids walked by nibbling on pod peas and stopped to pick out carrots under the watchful eyes of parents. One mother helped her son select a few carrots and onions, and paid for them with a Farm to Family coupon, a program for low-income families and individuals available through the Vermont Department for Children and Families. One woman paid for a cucumber with a $1 Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) token, asked if it had been washed and happily took a big bite from the end as she walked away.

Many of the customers did seem to be regulars, as Dev had said they would be. One older customer asked with concern, “Going to have a good season despite all the flooding?”

“It’s the nature of the enterprise,” Dev responded as he rubbed his fingers on a few beet greens to help him open a plastic bag.

“I heard the truck was starting to travel again. When does it come through?” asked another regular from the Old North End.

At around 11:30 a.m., DeSantis showed up to spell Dev for a short lunch and bathroom break, something that apparently is never planned but usually works out. “We just hope someone shows up,” DeSantis said. “If not, we find a friend and ask them to help out.”

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The final score

Customers continued steadily, buying a wide selection of almost everything on offer. The basil, fennel, arugula and beets were particularly adored. (Not the beet greens, which customers would frequently ask to have removed even when Dev politely noted that they were delicious and good for you, too.) The cabbage was sorely neglected. Questions ranged from how to cook escarole to (many times) “Is this arugula/mesclun/greens mix washed?”

“Yes, three times,” Dev would respond patiently each time.

By noon, Willow Hill Farm two stands away had sold out of blueberries and Diggers’ Mirth had sold its last two fennel bulbs to an older woman, who said she planned to make a recipe she’d found for fennel with sausage, tomato and onions.

A young woman came by asking for a donation of food to “Food Not Bombs,” an organization that cooks free meals for the needy. Dev said yes, but to return toward the end of the market. “That’s the kind of thing we like to support,” he said.

He took stock, estimated he’d probably sold 40 pounds of beans and replenished empty bins. “You guys wash this?” asked a customer holding up a bag of arugula. “We’re Americans, lazy by nature,” the customer said, laughing at himself.

The last sale was one huge glossy eggplant at 1:57 p.m. before Dev started packing away excess produce, a portion of which would end up at the food shelf and with the Intervale gleaning program. He was disappointed that the “Food Not Bombs” representative had not returned.

The truck was packed, the sidewalk swept of escaped green beans.

“It was an OK market,” concluded Diggers’ Mirth stand neighbor, Jane Sorensen of River Berry Farm. “For some reason, the tomatoes didn’t sell like I thought they would.”

Jen Smith of the Nomadic Oven swung by with some extra whoopie pies and Zuckerman of Full Moon Farm could be heard across the green calling, “Free chard! Anyone want some free chard?”